‘Tortoise caught in viral crypto death scam’
As reported by The Guardian:
World’s oldest tortoise caught in viral crypto death scam
At 194 years old, Jonathan the giant tortoise was a youngster when Queen Victoria ascended to the throne – and has now lived long enough to fall victim to a crypto scam.
News outlets including the BBC, Daily Mail and USA Today falsely reported his death after an X account posing as Jonathan’s vet broke the news.
Though the post received 2m views and was reported as fact by the UK’s national broadcaster, checks by the Guardian revealed the account was based in Brazil. The real vet, who does not use X, said: “Jonathan the tortoise is very much alive. I believe on X the person purporting to be me is asking for crypto donations, so it’s not even an April fool joke. It’s a con.”
The impostor was indeed asking for cryptocurrency donations at the time the BBC published – and later retracted – its report.
Jonathan, a Seychelles giant tortoise, is the world’s oldest known land animal. He has lived on the grounds of the governor’s mansion on Saint Helena, since 1882, when he arrived as a gift to the South Atlantic island.
Nigel Phillips, the governor, was getting ready for bed on Wednesday night when he was inundated with anxious messages. He got up and searched the grounds to check on the tortoise. “Jonathan is asleep under a tree in the paddock,” he told the Guardian, adding that the animal was “very much alive”.
The governor’s team trudged out into the rain on Thursday morning to take a picture of the sleepy-looking tortoise, who had just woken up from an 11-hour slumber. The twice-weekly local paper would not be out until later that day, so in lieu of that they posed the tortoise with an iPad showing the BBC homepage as proof of life.
The hoax had a happy ending for Jonathan, who was given a double helping of his favourite snack of bananas in celebration of his resurrection. He was seen enthusiastically munching the chopped-up fruit from the hand of one of his keepers.
And this, from a social media post by Guinness World Records:
PHEW
No, Jonathan the tortoise is not dead despite claims that the world's oldest land animal had died at the age of 193.
A spokesperson for the St Helena government confirmed to Guinness World Records that Jonathan is "alive and well".